Intercounties Fell

[Travs]

A great race yesterday over Latrigg/Lonscale/Skiddaw Little Man.

I must confess that when warming up i was really suffering from friday's race, and no doubt my long walk on saturday probably didn't help either.... on a gentle jog up the track round the back of Latrigg i was reduced to a walk. But once a couple of miles and some strides were under my belt i felt much better, and was looking forward to a battle with my 3 closely-matched team mates.

Up, around and over Latrigg then, and after some jockeying for position, i settled in to 2nd counter, expecting to catch the guy in front, but conscious of the two guys behind who on paper were the strongest.

Had a great section on the steep climb up the fence-line onto Lonscale, picking up about 10 places and dragging myself into first counter, where i remained until the summit of Skiddaw Little Man.

However the next guy, and on paper our strongest guy, had timed it to perfection, came out of nowhere, and was right on my tail.... he can actually descend so i had to forget about him, and he probably took two or three minutes out of me on the 20 minute descent back to Fitz Park.

My battle was for second and i had about 30 seconds head start..... with a reasonably competent run i stretched that out to well over a minute on the steepest section down Jenkin Hill.... but between Jenkin Hill and Latrigg Car Park, there's a small rise and then a few hundred metres of flat running, and this knocked me for six.... all the efforts of the weekend were coming back to haunt me.

I did my best to just let my legs free-wheel down the track back towards Keswick, and thought i was moving well enough, but turning at the road i saw my clubmate absolutely bolting down the track, no more than 10 seconds behind me, and seriously moving..... after a warning from a Warwickshire spectator that "he is going to catch me" (thanks for that!) i had a word with myself and tried to force my legs into action... managed to maintain the gap until we hit the cruel uphill finish on to the little rise behind Fitz Park pavillion... i did just enough to stagger over the line as 2nd counter, and promptly collapsed in a heap, totally spent from the effort.

Was very pleased with the race, went as well as expected.

I think Scotland North won.... i think the battle for English honours was between Yorkshire and Derbyshire, with Cumbria behind.

In the ladies' i didn't see too much as it started 15 minutes behind the men.... although Scout Adkin came rocketing past me with about a mile to go, so she was obviously clear in front, and i think Cumbria had three runners in the first half dozen or so, so they cleaned up the team prize.

A great weekend's racing and i'm very grateful i got the chance to put on the county vest again yesterday, i shall certainly give it full priority next year if i'm fortunate enough to be selected.